Last month, June, happened one of the biggest protests in Brazil history, this year this protest completed twelve years. The reason why this protest is so much studied with so many publications and others are not, it was its character totally spontaneous, unexpected, democratic and non-partisan. It were like, if the Brazilian people realized that they deserved a better government for the amount of taxes they pay. They deserve their rights respected and justice when those rights are violated. They deserve a country that has good jobs, development, good infrastructure, good health and education. We all in Brazil watched on TV and internet, millions of protesters went to the streets to protest against corruption, injustice, any kind of violence, bad use of public money, etc. Hundreds of protesters wearing Guy Fawkes mask. Thousands of protesters with posters asking for more investment in education, political inclusion, and governmental transparency and accountability. In my opinion, it was one of the most important and meaningful moments of the Brazilian history and a powerful demonstration of solidarity, empathy, independence, and political commitment of its people. Those protests called by some as "June Revolution," and by others as "June Journeys" must be always remembered. And it is good also to remember what the protesters were asking for and what has changed or haven't changed, after so many years. If you want to read more about those protests, access the posts of this blog during the month of June, I have been doing summaries about these protests since 2017. I've also, since 2020 a YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/@lucianofietto4773. Educative/cultural activism for a stronger democracy, a fairer justice, respect for human rights and governmental transparency. This post is a summary of the article published at https://socialistproject.ca/2013/07/b851/
The mass movements starting in June 2013 were the largest protests in Brazil in a generation, and they have shaken up the country's political system. Their explosive growth, size and extraordinary reach caught everyone by surprise. On 6 June, the Free Fare Movement, (MPL)a NGO started a small demonstration demanding the reversal of a recent increase in public transport fares. The MPL returned in larger numbers in the following days, and the police responded with increasing brutality, beating up demonstrators and wounding several journalists. In two weeks, the demonstrations had exploded in size while also spreading across the country. They attracted over one million people in hundreds of cities, and movements were taking place almost every day. In mid-June, the mainstream media changed sides, and started supporting the movement, sponsoring the multiplication and de-radicalization of demands, towards a cacophony focusing on broad citizenship issues and especially, state inefficiency and corruption. From this moment on, the demonstrators became more middle-class in compositio. they include banners about a whole range of issues, among them better public services, spending onthe 2014 World Cup infrastructure, legalization of drugs, compulsory voting, abortion, privatizations, and especially corruption. In common with recent movements elsewhere, the Brazilian demonstrations were largely organized through social media. In late June, the presidency attempted to take the initiative from above with a call for political reform and initiatives to increase spending in public services and improved health provision. While large capital did well economically in the last decade, and even longer, the middle class did not. So-called 'good jobs' are relatively scarce, higher education is no longer a guarantee of 'good' income, and the young find it hard to do better economically than their parents did. The emerging poor want to consume more, larger masses of people want social inclusion, and both want better public services. The middle class would like to benefit from good public services, but they are opposed to paying higher taxes in order to have them. They claim that they pay too much already, that corruption spirits away a large chunk of the government's revenues. At the same time, the press and the middle class completely disregard the fact that nearly half of the federal budget is committed to servicing the domestic public debt, effectively a welfare programme for the rich, and that this dwarfs the cost of social spending and federal transfer programmes. The economic slowdown would necessarily create social and political tensions because of existing dissatisfactions and conflicting aspirations, and the shrinking ability of the state to address them. The space to manage these contradictions has shrunk further in recent months. Inflation, the current deficit and the fiscal deficit are rising, and the currency is falling because of the decline in commodity prices, poor exports, and capital outflows. This has led the Central Bank to raise interest rates and the state-owned enterprises to cut spending and public investment. Dilma's approval in the opinion polls has plummeted. The protest movements in Brazil express deep frustrations and even despair, because it has become impossible to channel discontent through the traditional forms of social representation, which are either tightly controlled by the elite or have been disempowered by reforms. The need for organization and compromise within the movement and with outside institutions suggest that recomposing the working-class, and overcoming its material fragmentation requires collectivity in practice. The response of the federal government to the movements, after considerable hesitation, was precisely to seek left support, and propose a programme of political reforms and expansion of public service provision which could bring concrete gains. The government must align itself with the workers' organizations, inorder to push through democratic reforms including the break-up of the media monopolies, and improved education, health and public transport services. This was unquestionably the most important movement in Brazil in the last thirty years. The point now, is to continue to fight to broaden the movement, and attract the middle class, and push for policy changes. If this can be achieved, it would shift the political balance in the country, and it could lead to concrete long-term gains to the workers in Brazil.
